UK planning to leave the European Court of Human Rights?

@ArishMell i reject that notion because u.k. has internal courts for its citizens and should separate from any international or european multinational court.

@strait46 The U.K. (capitals!) does indeed conduct its legal affairs independently of national and international politics, but like most countries, is also subject to, and strives to uphold, international treaties it helped to develop.

Those do not create national laws directly but set legal frameworks for nations to transpose into their own administrative and judicial systems. (The EU calls the frameworks it creates by the tonne, "Directives"; and most cover industry, trade, travel and environmental matters.)

As we are no longer in the European Union we are not now overseen by the European Courts of Justice, which is purely the internal disciplinary body settling EU-only governmental disputes with the EU.

We are though, and I hope remain, in the European Court of Human Rights we helped establish, which is entirely separate from the EU; and the United Nations.

In fact the UK is a member of or signatory to more than ninety international bodies, treaties and agreements; not only the Commonwealth, UN, NATO, the ISO, and various multi-nation trade arrangements. And was a founder-member of many of them.

"No man is an island" - I forget who said that, but nowadays also no nation is, except in physical geography.

@ArishMell how can you WANT an outsider to interpret and decide your treaties? your UK government is the only one to explain their goals and intentions.

@strait46 I don't want that and it was one reason I wanted the UK to leave the EU; but otherwise, that's not quite how it works.

Governments of many countries including ours co-operate on a huge range of matters. They have to, otherwise very little could or would work!

Sometimes that co-operation extends to membership of international bodies and treaties, and to ensure these are any use they do require some legislation, but the member governments are still autonomous.

It's rather as if you belong to a sports-club in a league: your club runs its own affairs for its own members, but still must abide by the league rules to ensure fair competitions and mutual social exchanges.

So the international body agrees the framework rules for everyone to follow; but because the member-governments have their own political, economic and judicial systems they write the "league" rules into their own Statutes in their own way - as long as still to the same ends.


If someone, probably a commercial company but it can be a government, breaks those laws it is for the appropriate authorities to investigate and if it comes to Court for the judiciary to decide the sentence by its own national laws. For a government with a parliamentary system and independent judiciary (e.g. the UK and USA), the top internal judges - and many parliamentary politicians of both sides - soon tell the government where it is going wrong.

Whether external punishments can be applied if a government persist in breaking the rules depends very much on the individual body and case; but are usually trade-sanctions or very big fines. The latter of course being tax-payers' money as there is such a thing as Government Spending but no such thing as "Government [or EU or UN] Money".


Generally speaking it all works fine and everyone rubs along reasonably well: traders trade, investors invest, tourists tour, they don't fight each other but might vow to defend each other, etc.

It does that only because everyone has agreed that it shall be so. There is no serious loss of sovereignty in most of these arrangements, although some in the EU want "ever-closer union", i.e. a single "European Union of the Cities and Regions" as is the bloc's rarely-quoted correct, full title.

Though to be fair, many of major EU Directives are actually EU-translations of, or created under, international agreements created by the United Nations, International Standards Organisation, etc. Of which two "leagues", the US and UK are both fully paid-up, active members.

If you work for a company accredited to ISO9001 or ISO14001, you will be working under two such international agreements; respectively of quality-assurance control and of environmental protection standards. They were made by the ISO not the US Government; but with active US Government participation. Yet the ISO does not rule Uncle Sam! (Actually, international trade would control whether your exporting manufacturers find or lose custom by it, especially for defence and other highly-sensitive work.)


So to answer your question, of course I do not "want" my country run by outsiders, any more you do yours, but neither nation would function properly if they did not do so in an internationally co-operative manner that can and does mean some binding agreements.